Roam vs Ato
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Roam
This app helps you plan and record outdoor adventures, combining maps, routes, photos, and notes into a personal diary. Explore trails, save memories, and share your journeys.
- Map layers (public lands, satellite)
- Trail discovery
- Route recording
- Photo and note integration
- Live location sharing
- Offline map downloads
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Explore more. Plan smarter. Capture every adventure. Easiest and simplest app out there. ROAM Adventure Diary brings maps, routes, photos, notes, and memories together in one easy-to-use app. Whether you are hiking, backpacking, biking, camping, motorcycling, riding an ATV, paddling, overlanding, or traveling somewhere new, ROAM helps you plan the journey and preserve the complete story of every trip. Explore map layers, find trails, plan where you want to go, record the path you take, and save the moments that make each adventure yours. Instead of leaving your routes, photos, and notes scattered across different apps, ROAM organizes everything into a personal adventure diary you can revisit and share anytime. MAP YOUR ADVENTURE • Explore multiple map layers, including public lands, BLM lands, national forests, national parks, LiDAR, and satellite imagery • Discover trails for a wide range of activities using National Forest Service and National Park Service data • Switch between light and dark themes and view maps in 2D or 3D • Navigate an intuitive experience designed to be fast and easy to use • Personalize your adventures with flexible tools and features • Search within the app using AI-powered tools • Stay connected with Offline map downloads CREATE A RICHER TRIP RECORD • Add photos and notes as your journey unfolds • Share your live location with the people you choose • Save discoveries, views, campsites, hotels and meaningful stops • Keep every route connected to its memories • Turn each outing into a story—not just a line on a map YOUR PERSONAL ADVENTURE DIARY • Plan outings and keep everything organized in one place you control • Record waypoints or track your route as you go • See where your favorite moments happened and share them • Preserve details that might otherwise fade • Build a lasting map of the places you have explored EVERYWHERE YOU ROAM ROAM is made for hikers, backpackers, motorcyclists, cyclists, travelers, campers, paddlers, road trippers, overlanders, and anyone who wants a more meaningful record of time spent outdoors. Every route has a story. Keep yours with ROAM Adventure Diary. Terms of Use (EULA): https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/
Ato
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Ato (アト, Japanese for "trace" or "footprint") is a quiet, unhurried walking app. RECORD A WALK Open it and Ato draws the path you walk as a single line, with distance, time and pace. Lock the screen, put the phone in your pocket — it keeps recording quietly, and the Live Activity on your lock screen shows how far you have come. MY TRACES The places you have walked are counted as tiles. Walking the same street again never adds one — only going somewhere new does. See how many tiles you have lit, how much ground you have covered, and what percentage of each district you have walked: "Da'an District 13.6%". RANKS Seven tiers, from Couch Potato to Legendary Walker. Your rank comes from your daily average over the last seven days and is recalculated every time you open the app — so it reflects the walker you are now, not a lifetime total. It goes up, and it can go down. Distance at walking pace counts fully; riding counts 30%. The walk to the station still counts, but rank is earned on foot. CITY EXPLORATION CHESTS Every kilometre on foot earns a chest holding a random keepsake badge. There are eleven to collect, and when you go out changes what you find — larks in the early morning, dusk in the evening. Collect five of the same badge and you can wear it as an avatar frame. (All free. There are no in-app purchases.) HISTORY AND MONTHLY RECAP Every walk is kept: this week, this month, lifetime distance, milestone badges, and a monthly recap you can open at the end of the month. When a walk ends you can turn the route into a card and share it. MEET UP WITH FRIENDS Shopping separately? Open a meet-up room and send the code or link — one tap and they are in. See each other's position and distance on the map, drop a meeting point, send a quick signal ("I'm here!"). Your lock screen shows how far away they are. FRIENDS Add friends with a friend code and see who is walking or meeting up right now. Friends are sorted by rank; tap one to see their totals, coverage and badges. Cheer their latest walk with kudos. With three friends, your whole week counts ×1.5. (You can see each other's numbers — but never each other's routes. That stays private.) REMINDERS Optional daily notifications: a gentle nudge in the morning, and at night how far to walk tomorrow to reach the next rank. Both can be turned off at any time. SIGN IN WITH APPLE (OPTIONAL) You can record walks, see your history and coverage without an account. Sign in and your walks are backed up to your own private cloud space, so a new phone keeps everything — and friend features become available. ANONYMOUS CROWD HEATMAP Curious which area is busy right now? The heatmap shows how many people are walking nearby, completely anonymously: your position is blurred into a coarse grid cell on your device before it is ever sent, so others see density, never you. PRIVACY • No forced sign-up; Sign in with Apple is your choice • Location is used only while recording a walk or sharing in a room, and stops when you finish • Location sharing happens only in rooms you chose to join • Your walking routes are yours alone — friends cannot see them • Avatar photos are visible only to friends you have both added, and can be removed anytime • Heatmap data is anonymised and cannot be traced back to a person • Walks live on your phone; signed in, they are also stored where only you can reach them • Sign out or delete your account and all cloud data from inside the app, anytime • We do not sell data, show ads, track you, or sell anything in the app Tell us anything through "Feedback" inside the app. Walk slowly. Leave today's trace.
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is in-app purchases: Ato at none against Roam's 1. On price, update cadence, ads and device support there is nothing between them.
Scored on Price · Rating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings · Update frequency · Ads · In-app purchases · Monetization · Best chart rank · Devices · Requires iOS
Both are free to download. Roam sells 1 in-app purchase, starting at $25.00 per year. Ato asks for nothing beyond the download.
Roam ships an update every 4 days, Ato every 3 days. The most recent releases landed on November 5, 2026 and October 31, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | Roam | Ato |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 5.0 (1 ratings) — better | — |
| Number of ratings | 1 — better | — |
| Update frequency | Every 4 days | Every 3 days — better |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | Yes | No — better |
| Monetization | Free with in-app purchases | — |
| Devices | iPhone, iPod | iPhone, iPod |
| Requires iOS | 15.1 | 15.0 — better |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 123 MB | 4 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 17+ |
| Developer | jamie bauer | cheng yiting |
In-app purchases
Roam
- ROAM Pro1 Year trial$25.001 Year
Ato
No in-app purchases







